


Coming Up For Air

by erimeri (blujoonie)



Category: Carry On Series - Rainbow Rowell
Genre: Baz is a boob chick, Baz knows CPR, F/F, Femslash, Fighting, First Kiss, Kissing, Swimmer! AU, Swimmer! Simon, Useless Lesbians, bc they r angry 😤, but is also lowkey useless, but nobody dies dw, fem!SnowBaz, fiona and sophie brotp, petty girl fights, shes only there for sophie poor gal, swimming trainer fiona, tw drowning, yall can fight me on this
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-06
Updated: 2020-05-06
Packaged: 2021-03-02 02:29:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,912
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23897548
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blujoonie/pseuds/erimeri
Summary: My back is flush to the door and Snow is nearly nose-to-nose with me, standing on her tip-toes.Her hair is still wet, drops of water falling onto my bare shoulders. She smells of chlorine, a scent so disgusting I would gag, but when it’s coming from Sophie I don’t seem to mind.It’s pathetic, and gross, and all this romantic word vomit spilling out in my mind makes me seem weaker.I don’t seem to mind about that, either.
Relationships: Fiona Pitch & Simon Snow, Tyrannus Basilton "Baz" Pitch/Simon Snow
Comments: 10
Kudos: 99





	Coming Up For Air

**Author's Note:**

> i don’t want to say that this was for femslash feb,,, but it was 😔  
> this took me four fucking months to write because my gay ass was too busy obsessing over lesbian pirates and i’m so sorry abt it i hope u like it anyways

“Shit!” I shout as I feel a wave of cold water splash over me.

There can only be one source for that freezing cold water.

“What the fuck, Snow?”

“What?”

“You just- you,” I choke, scandalized, “you literally soaked me with water. Could you not, I don’t know,  _ splash? _ ”

My hair is dripping wet and my sweater is drenched with water that reeks of chlorine. I’m ninety-nine per cent sure that my mascara is smudged. Fuck. I put time and effort into my makeup and she does  _ this? _

“This is swimming,” she deadpans.

“Yeah, I know.” I scowl.

“So, I’m supposed to splash. Right, Fiona?”

“I mean, the kid’s not wrong,” Fiona says, shrugging and throwing me a smirk over her shoulder before moving to get a pair of life jackets. The bastard.

“You made this whole book  _ wet _ !” I yell, shoving the hand with the now soggy book in front of me. Shame, it was a good book.

“Yeah, well you’re not supposed to bring a book to a pool; you’re supposed to  _ swim! _ ” She yells back with equal amounts of anger and confusion.

“Jesus fucking Christ.” I jump off my chair and make a beeline for Fiona’s office to grab myself a new pair of clothes and my phone. (Trust me, I don’t think I’m going to risk another book getting ruined because of Snow’s inability to be somewhat graceful.)

I’m thinking about moving back to the deck to watch Snow swim (because I’m weak) but I decide against it because that argument was far too embarrassing and I feel like the small amount of dignity I had left has disappeared.

I head towards the canteen of the recreation center and buy myself a pack of walkers and a juice box and glance at the obnoxiously large clock in the main lounge. It’ll be about five minutes until Fiona’s class finishes.

Fiona’s the only female swimming trainer in this recreation center (and to be fair… It’s a small town, there are only a few trainers here in  _ total _ .) She started after Mum died, and the fact that she finds swimming comforting when my Mum  _ died _ because of it, is somewhat deranged. But I can’t judge her about it, we all cope in different ways, but in this, Fiona and I both do it in the same manner.

Fiona doesn’t do private lessons, she says it feels weird to be training somebody one-on-one, even though she would earn more out of it. So, it’s a group of girls. The lot that Sophie is in consists of a girl named Penelope (who’s equally as annoying as Snow but more tolerable), Philippa, Trixie, and Keris.

Philippa seems dead on her feet half the time she’s here, and Trixie and Keris are the couple who come to swim for the sole reason of snogging underwater.

People say I come to these classes to ogle all the pretty, half-naked girls. They’re wrong. I don’t do that to all the girls, I only do that to Sophie. And I’ve actually been training to be a lifeguard, fit with CPR and everything.

Snow joined the training center at the age of eleven, and she’s been trained by Fiona and only Fiona since. It was insufferable. They both worked their arses off to annoy me as much as they could. It works. But I don’t show it, because if I do, they’d only try harder.

Honestly, their friendship should be fucking illegal.

I hear the shrill ringing of a bell then a wave of laughter, indicating that their session was over. Luckily, it was the last session, meaning I can finally go home and daydream of Sophie in that maddeningly beautiful swimsuit she always decides to wear.

“C’mon, kiddo, time to go home.” Fiona says, coming out of the change rooms with her hair tied up in a bun.

I look up from my phone to raise an eyebrow, “any plans for dinner?”

She opens her mouth, then closes it, then opens it again, mimicking a fish. “I mean,” she drawls, “we could always get takeout.”

I huff out a laugh and stand up from my chair, “let’s go.”

Fiona whips her hand in the air and lets out a loud  _ whoop _ . “Maccies it is, then!”

Fiona and I head home, her hands filled with bags of takeout while I gag at the amount of chips she can shove into her mouth at once. It’s lovely to be just us. Just Fiona and Baz. It’s only us these days. 

It feels nice, having a place where you belong, where you don’t have to worry about  _ what  _ and  _ who _ you are. I may be Baz Pitch outside of this house, but inside I’m just Baz. I’m just Baz who happens to unfortunately be in love with Sophie Snow.

She always asks me  _ why _ I come to these classes if I don’t swim. 

(It’s mainly because everytime I take even a  _ step _ inside water I feel like I’m suffocating.)

And I could simply answer with  _ because I don’t want to _ . But the answer isn’t really that simple. If I didn’t want to swim, why would I come to the sessions? Why would I constantly watch people swim?

My Mum drowned at sea. Because of  _ me. _

I don’t have any set proof that she’s  _ dead _ .

When I was five, my Mum and I went to the beach with Fiona. Fiona was preparing our food when my mum gave into my incessant begging to swim. She took me out to sea, a little too deep, but I wasn’t scared; my Mum was with me. The waves started to get larger and larger, but we paid no attention, too busy playing with each other. Until an absolutely  _ massive _ wave washed over us, pulling me out of my Mum’s grasp. I wailed while the sea snatched my mum away from me, right in front of my eyes.

It hurts to think about it, even though I saw a poor replica of the sea almost everyday, it’s like a disturbingly morbid version of comfort.

It’s borderline idiotic of me to come to these classes. I don’t do anything; I sit, and watch, and stare at someone that’ll never like me. Someone that’ll never  _ want _ me. 

But that never stops me, does it?

\--

The next day, Fiona had four classes, none of which contained Sophie’s lot. So, I decided not to go that day, instead opting to stay indoors and catch up on my reading and poorly attempting to fix the book that Sophie had soaked.

It doesn’t work. I try not to be sad about it.

Our flat isn’t all that special. It’s big enough for the two of us and is adorned with an assortment of plants (courtesy of Fiona. She’s got a weird hobby with plants, I don’t understand why she loves them so much.) 

(I once caught her talking to one of them. She got beyond pissed and ordered takeout for a week. Disgusting. I’m sure my taste buds have burnt out because of the shitload of Maccies Fiona makes the both of us eat.)

There are two bedrooms, along with a small kitchen.

I don’t do much that day, I read, I finish an essay that was due in a week, cook today's dinner because I  _ do not _ fancy eating takeout again, and do the dishes. 

The day goes by in a blur, nothing particularly interesting to make me remember what had happened.

The next week was Sophie’s class, I pretend not to know and act surprised when Fiona wakes me up. But she knows, she knows everything.

I pack my bag, this time with an extra jumper or two because who  _ knows _ what Sophie will do this time, and my wrinkled and destroyed book (caused by Sophie, as always.).

Call me petty, but I want to know what would happen if I asked her to replace it.

I shove my phone into the pockets of my jeans (which have tights underneath, it’s fucking freezing outside. I don’t know why they still do classes in winter, it’s like they’re  _ trying  _ to give me influenza.)

I follow after Fiona towards her car and jump into the passenger seat.

“Someone’s excited.” Fiona says as she starts the car, a smirk adorning her face.

“No. No, I’m just excited to, you know, be a lifeguard.”

Fiona snorts, “oh yeah, I definitely know.”

I sneer at her and lean my head against the window, willing for the car to move faster so I don’t have to spend anymore time with Fiona poking at my love for Sophie.

“Oh come on, can I please be invited to the wedding at least?”

“Shut  _ up _ .”

We reach the recreation center within a couple minutes and I jump out the car (no, not out the window, I open the door like a normal human being and  _ then _ jump out.)

I try not to look like a hyper-active puppy when we start to walk towards the recreation center, but Fiona’s laugh all but tells me that I failed miserably. 

Fiona leaves me in her office to go take a shower and change, but I wandered out of it five minutes after she left. Her office is hellishly boring, and I wasn’t even allowed to snoop around. So, I did what any other person would do. I snooped. And then left the office shortly after.

I had been to this recreation center (since I was seven years old) and no other because a) Fiona taught here and b) Sophie was here. So there really was no reason for me to explore. I don’t know why I left, and because I did, I ran straight into Sophie. Our foreheads knocked together and she fell to the ground with a pained groan. The hand that wasn’t too busy holding my backpack flew up to my forehead.

“Watch where the fuck you’re going, Snow.”

“Watch where  _ I’m _ going? You literally bumped into  _ me _ !”

I scoff and swerve around her as she stands up. Shit, she isn’t going to back down, is she?

Her eyes are wide and her shirt has slid down one of her shoulders. 

When I make a move to leave, she grabs my hand to prevent me from walking away, and that touch shoots sparks up my arm. It takes all of me to not jump her. 

I clear my throat and shake my arm out of her grasp, because if she held it any longer, I would have no control over myself.

“Let it be, I know you didn’t mean to stumble into me. Now, just apologize and things’ll be alright.” I say, because I’m lazy, and because I don’t want to waste all my newly thought insults right now when I have the  _ whole day _ (and by a whole day I mean an hour) to present them to her.

“Why would I apologize?”

“Because  _ you  _ decided it would be pleasant to bump into  _ me _ .”

She sputters and turns a brilliant shade of red that contrasts with her tawny skin, “it’s not like I did it on  _ purpose _ . Your head is stuck so far up your arse that you can’t even accept your own mistake.”

Now it was my turn to sputter. And I do, I was rightly scandalized. 

“Alright you two! As much as I love watching young love blossom, I’m sick and tired of you two flirting.”

I jump at the sound of a new voice, only to realize it’s Fiona. 

And it’s exceptionally embarrassing, so I do the next best thing. 

I run.

To the deck, of course. Fiona’s due to clear out the pool for her class in about five minutes, so that means the public session was still on.

That means I can yell at children to stop running on deck. (they’re real bastards, I tell you. Don’t listen to anything I say. I wonder if I was like that when I was little.) (Now I really wanna ask Fiona, fuck.)

I head out and go for my usual seat. The one for the lifeguard. Sophie says I’m not fit to be a lifeguard, I think otherwise.

I’ll show her I’m perfectly useful. Someday. Preferably with my mouth, but things don’t always go the way you want them to.

I sigh, and jump when I feel a hand on my shoulder (I’m jumping a lot these days, Christ.) 

“Baz.”

“Fi.”

“So.”

“‘So’ what?”

“What’s with you and Snow?” 

“Nothing.”

“Pretty sure there’s somethin’.”

“Pretty sure there’s  _ nothing _ .”

Fiona laughs, it’s not soft.

Shit, I’m in trouble.

“Quit being a prat, alright?”

“I’m truly sorry, my dear auntie, afraid I can’t do that. I was born a Pitch. I’m quite sure that it’s engraved in my soul.”

“Don’t try and be smart with me,” she snaps, “you keep giving Snow a hard time.”

“Since when did you care?”

“Since it started to affect her ability to swim properly. She thinks you’re plotting.”

“Yeah, I am.” I murmur, “Plotting on how to get her to fall in love with me.”

Fiona barks out a loud laugh, and it scares me. I’m afraid of my own fucking aunt. Just fucking  _ dandy _ .

She pats me on the back and says, “you’ve got it  _ bad _ , Baz.” then proceeds to saunter off to god knows where.

There’s just a few minutes until their class starts, and I’m fairly certain Snow has already told Bunce about what happened. So attempting to talk to her is not a wise choice.

I take a seat at the lifeguard chair and set my bag beside me. The locker room isn’t a safe place to stow away my things, so I tend to bring them out onto the deck with me. Even though Fiona says  _ not  _ to, I do it anyways. Since when did I listen to what she said?

Their class starts with a ring of a bell (which I swear is something akin to a banshee) and all the kids run straight towards the changing rooms with their parents in tow. 

I spend a good half of the session staring at my phone (and Sophie) and being stared at by Fiona whenever she doesn’t have to guide her lot. 

She seems quite annoyed. Good, serves her right for being nosey.

It’s quite odd, actually. The class is unusually quiet. Now that I think about it, I haven’t heard Sophie make a daft remark about how I’m plotting or just about how pretty the water looks.

I haven’t heard her splashes either. I’m too far in my head to hear Fiona the first few times, but when she yells my name for the fifth time, I figure it’s important. 

I can hear a bunch of the girls start to scream, and I’d be lying if I said that it didn’t give me a headache and scare the shit out of me at the same time.

I look up only to see her panicked expression and promptly jump out of my chair.

_ It better not be about Sophie, it better not be about Sophie, it better not be about Sophie. _

There’s a blob of  _ something _ under the water and since it keeps creating waves of water I can’t figure out who it is. I take a quick glance around their section and set it in my head that it's what I hoped it wasn’t.

Sophie is drowning. Because she was too busy paying attention to my so-called plotting to pay attention to  _ herself _ .

Fucking idiot, I think, and then I jump into the water.

The first mistake I made is going in front of Sophie. Her legs are kicking rapidly and one of them jab at my stomach. It makes me suck in a mouthful of water and I have to go up to the surface to take in another breath of air.

I make my way around Snow’s body. Her arms are flailing everywhere and it’s making everything worse. I can see Fiona’s legs moving near the stair entrance, so I take that as my cue to jam my hands into her armpits and push her towards Fiona.

As soon as Fiona gets a proper grasp on Sophie I practically leap out of the water. My eyes sting and I feel like the taste of chlorine is going to me embedded in my mouth for a good few weeks.

Fiona’s tilting Sophie’s head up and down to clear her airways while yelling at her to  _ wake the fuck up _ . “Water can’t kill you, you’re a stubborn bitch.”

The rest of the girls are in the water near the shallow end, gaping, while Bunce is crying on Fiona’s side.

The air feels is thick with either embarrassment or a big  _ what the fuck just happened  _ kind of mood and I can’t seem to distinguish which one it is.

I look at Fiona and I can see her lips moving but I don’t know what she’s saying. I feel like I don’t know anything anymore.

I fix my tank top and drag it further down my torso. I want it to swallow me whole. My whole being is full of shame and anger and I  _ don’t know what to do _ .

The girls leave sooner or later, whispering things to Fiona while she tries to make Sophie stand up. I want to yell at her. 

_ Why’d you do that? _

Sophie’s eyes are open, panicked. They flicker from Fiona to the water to me.

_ Don’t look at me. _

It takes all of me to sneer and not collapse into her arms. But that’s all I want. And that’s all I’ll never have.

_ Why is it my fault? _

“Wait for me in my office, I’ll call your mom.” 

Sophie nods and bites her lip. She turns on the balls of her feet and dashes towards the staff area without sparing me a glance

Of course I walk after her, I want answers. 

She won’t be able to bullshit with it either. I’m very persistent.

I saunter into Fiona’s office and see Snow sitting on her desk. She stumbles to get out of the chair but I raise my hand.

“It’s alright, I’m not going to tell her.”

She tries to raise an eyebrow, but it just looks like she’s having a stroke. “Why would I be afraid of you telling on me for sitting on a desk?”

“Because it’s Fiona.”

She shrugs, “fair enough.”

Looking at her hurts. Looking at her right after she almost  _ drowned  _ hurts. Like my mum, and it hurts to think about it.

But it was fucking stupid of her to look at me while swimming.

Snow sighs and runs a hand through her hair. It’s short. Very short. She had it cut to right below her ears about two years ago and has kept with that style since. I think it looks a little too good on her. The bronze curls compliment her tan and her blue eyes provide the contrast Snow needs to look absolutely ethereal.

I hate her.

I lean on the doorframe, “you almost died.”

Snow all but chokes, “I mean, yeah, um, but like-”

“Can you not string a coherent sentence without sounding like you’re choking on your own voice?”

Snow frowns, and I hate that I was the reason for it. “Why are you such an arse?”

I raise a brow.

She jumps off the desk and makes her way towards me.

“I have no idea what you’re referring to, Snow.” I say, raising my chin up.

She growls and I shiver.

What the fuck?

She stalks even closer, and at this point I’m about 3 feet away from the door. And the door is closed.

I close my eyes, curse every deity out there, and open my eyes to find blue parallel to mine. I yelp, it scares the shit out of me.

“Sophie, what-”

“Shut up.”

I furrow my eyebrows, because I’m genuinely scared and I don’t feel like dying at the ripe age of 19.

My back is flush to the door and Snow is nearly nose-to-nose with me, standing on her tip-toes.

Her hair is still wet, drops of water falling onto my bare shoulders. She smells of chlorine, a scent so disgusting I would gag, but when it’s coming from Sophie I don’t seem to mind. 

It’s pathetic, and gross, and all this romantic word vomit spilling out in my mind makes me seem weaker.

I don’t seem to mind about that, either.

Sophie’s gaze doesn’t falter when I raise a brow. “Have I done something to pique your interest, Snow?”

“Yeah. Exist.” 

I furrow my eyebrows and try to sneer. It falls flat because I’m a hundred per cent her hip bone is digging into my thighs and that much contact is going to make me internally combust.

“What’s the Mystery of Baz Pitch?”

“What?” I squint at her and I feel my nostrils flare. 

“Why do you do this.” She squints at me, “You don’t swim, yet manage to attend every single class that I come to.” 

I open my mouth to object, but she silences me with a press of her finger on my lip.

“No, no no. Don’t deny it. Pen told me.”

The fact that Sophie might know why I come terrifies me, and my will to leave this room keeps increasing every second. I try to move back, but my shoulder blades are digging into the wood and this wood isn’t even  _ good quality _ . I can’t risk getting a splinter.

“You don’t say anything to me except insults. But you watch me every second you get.” She tilts her head as she says this and my breath hitches.

“You’re an idiot to think that the world revolves around you.”

The corner of her lip tilts upwards. “Yeah, I guess. But it seems that your world revolves around me.”

We’re practically sharing the air we breathe. She’s so close that everytime she speaks her lips are  _ so close _ to touching mine.

“And you don’t seem to mind.”

And then she surges forward, her lips catching mine. 

The moment is over as soon as it starts.

“Baz.”

I’m still dazed, so all that comes out of my mouth is a pathetic, “what?”

The left side of her mouth quirks up, and there’s a mole there. So I do what I’ve been wanting to do since we were 11. I kiss it, then I kiss her nose to her cheekbone to her jaw until I reach the corner of her lips.

I laugh when she snarls, “just fucking  _ kiss me _ .” So I do.

Her hands are grasping my shoulders, but I can still feel her trembling from the pressure on the balls of her feet for tip-toeing so long, so I move her back to Fiona’s desk and set her atop it.

She yelps when I do, “I sat on a pen.”

I snort at her idiocy and give her a feather light kiss on her nose. Snow’s about 2 inches taller than me now that I’ve set her on the desk. She weaves her hand into my hair and shakes my bun loose. I scowl at her in response.

“Why did you-” 

She shuts me up with a kiss, and instead of fighting back, I let her wrap her legs around my waist and snog me senseless. 

For the first time, I figure that Snow’s won this argument. And for the first time, I feel that I’ve properly won Snow over.

**Author's Note:**

> yes i do realize if sophie did swimming for that many years she probably would not have drowned, i’m just too lazy to find new plot  
> yell at me bc of this on [tumblr](https://eriimeri.tumblr.com/)


End file.
